Are Britain’s local councils ready for the electric car revolution?
A Freedom of Information investigation by carmaker Vauxhall UK has revealed that over 70% of UK councils have no strategy in place to install on-street residential charging points for electric vehicles despite the country lagging behind its target of installing 300,000 by 2030.
Forty percent of households do not have a driveway, rising to sixty percent in urban areas and the shortage of on street charging points means millions of potential EV owners are unable to charge at home[1], just seven years ahead of the deadline for all carmakers to cease production of petrol and diesel vehicles.
Vauxhall released the figures today as it announced it is setting up an ‘Enablement Fund’ to help improve Local Authority understanding of residential on-street charging needs across the next 12 months.
Residential on-street charging solutions include lamp post chargers, which can be installed and working within as little as 30 minutes, and innovative pavement-mounted bollards.
The FOI application to 414 councils and local authorities in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland also reveals that 69% of local authorities have yet to install any on-street chargers.
According to the 289 councils who responded only 14,188 new points are planned for the rest of the year, well behind the run rate required to hit the Government’s target of having 300,000 running by the end of 2030.
In response, Vauxhall – which will offer an electric version of every car and van model in its line-up and has pledged to only sell electric vehicles in the UK by 2028 – has set up the multi-year ‘Electric Streets of Britain’ programme to make sure drivers without driveways are not left behind in the transition to electric mobility.
Vauxhall has teamed up with leading charging operators Char.gy, Connected Kerb, and Surecharge in setting up the multi-year ‘Enablement Fund’ to help councils understand the scale of on-street charging issues, and the solutions available, ahead of the Government’s planned ban on the sale of new combustion engine cars in 2030.
Vauxhall has also set up a new national database for the public to register their needs, enabling councils to invest Government funds where demand for on-street EV charging already exists.
On-street electric car charging is seen as critical to EV uptake as current data shows that 80% of all EV charging is done at home.
With 12,708 residential on-street residential charge points installed to date and a further 6,397 planned to be installed over the next year, London will soon be home to 19,105 on-street charge points – more than double the number of on-street charge points available across all other regions of the UK combined.
Vauxhall’s research also highlighted the need for further support across all four corners of the United Kingdom – Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland made up three of the four regions of the country projecting the lowest number of on-street charge points planned to be installed over the coming year.
Of the councils who responded to the investigation across the UK, 45% confirmed they had no plans to install residential on-street chargers this year.
Forty percent of households do not have a driveway, rising to sixty percent in urban areas and the shortage of on street charging points means millions of potential EV owners are unable to charge at home[1], just seven years ahead of the deadline for all carmakers to cease production of petrol and diesel vehicles.
Vauxhall released the figures today as it announced it is setting up an ‘Enablement Fund’ to help improve Local Authority understanding of residential on-street charging needs across the next 12 months.
Residential on-street charging solutions include lamp post chargers, which can be installed and working within as little as 30 minutes, and innovative pavement-mounted bollards.
The FOI application to 414 councils and local authorities in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland also reveals that 69% of local authorities have yet to install any on-street chargers.
According to the 289 councils who responded only 14,188 new points are planned for the rest of the year, well behind the run rate required to hit the Government’s target of having 300,000 running by the end of 2030.
In response, Vauxhall – which will offer an electric version of every car and van model in its line-up and has pledged to only sell electric vehicles in the UK by 2028 – has set up the multi-year ‘Electric Streets of Britain’ programme to make sure drivers without driveways are not left behind in the transition to electric mobility.
Vauxhall has teamed up with leading charging operators Char.gy, Connected Kerb, and Surecharge in setting up the multi-year ‘Enablement Fund’ to help councils understand the scale of on-street charging issues, and the solutions available, ahead of the Government’s planned ban on the sale of new combustion engine cars in 2030.
Vauxhall has also set up a new national database for the public to register their needs, enabling councils to invest Government funds where demand for on-street EV charging already exists.
On-street electric car charging is seen as critical to EV uptake as current data shows that 80% of all EV charging is done at home.
With 12,708 residential on-street residential charge points installed to date and a further 6,397 planned to be installed over the next year, London will soon be home to 19,105 on-street charge points – more than double the number of on-street charge points available across all other regions of the UK combined.
Vauxhall’s research also highlighted the need for further support across all four corners of the United Kingdom – Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland made up three of the four regions of the country projecting the lowest number of on-street charge points planned to be installed over the coming year.
Of the councils who responded to the investigation across the UK, 45% confirmed they had no plans to install residential on-street chargers this year.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 So we found through our Freedom of Information request that 70% of councils currently don't
00:08 have a published strategy for on-street charging provision. And that's really important because
00:12 80% of current charging of electric vehicles happens at home because it's the most convenient
00:17 and affordable way to charge your vehicle. And we know that in the UK, 40% of households
00:22 don't have a driveway, so they don't have access to off-street parking.
00:26 Vauxhall has teamed up with several charging operators in setting up a multi-year enablement
00:31 fund to help councils understand the scale of on-street charging issues and the solutions
00:37 available. That's ahead of the government's planned ban on the sale of new combustion
00:41 engine cars in 2030. The company has also set up a new national database for the public
00:47 to register their needs, enabling councils to invest government funds where demand for
00:52 on-street EV charging already exists.
00:55 Yes, so the government's provided funding through the Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure
00:59 Fund, so that's circa £340 million that's available for local councils to access for
01:04 generating on-street charging. But as we know, 50% currently haven't installed any on-street
01:09 chargers at all. So the enablement fund is really about educating those councils through
01:15 working with our charge point provider partners to make sure they understand the need for
01:19 this infrastructure, and then critically come up with the plan, map with this map that we're
01:25 developing, heat map through the website of where there is demand, so we can put the two
01:30 things together and ensure we get the right solutions into the right places and make sure
01:34 the 40% of people without driveways aren't left behind as we transition to electric.
01:39 Recent data reveals a robust uptick in the automotive sector. July saw a 28.3% rise in
01:46 new car registrations, totalling 143,921 vehicles. This is the strongest July performance
01:53 since 2020, although sales still lag behind pre-pandemic levels. Fleet sales are the primary
01:59 driver of this growth, with large fleet orgers surging by nearly 63%. Other business registrations
02:06 also rose by 28.7%, contributing 2,915 new cars. However, private new car sales only
02:14 grew by a marginal one third of a percent, selling 60,045 new models. This slow growth
02:21 raises concerns, especially as the industry and government target increased electric vehicle
02:28 adoption.
02:29 We can see that there's demand there for electric vehicles. We know all the benefits of electric
02:33 cars in terms of the zero tailpipe emissions, but also faster acceleration, much smoother,
02:42 much quieter. We know that people won't go back to petrol or diesel once they've chosen
02:46 an electric car. But what we've got to make sure is that one of those biggest barriers,
02:50 which is access to that local charging, is overcome. And that's why we've launched Electric
02:54 Streets, to make sure we build this database of where there is demand, and then work with
02:58 the local councils to make sure all local councils have a plan for this provision.
03:02 [BLANK_AUDIO]